Pubdate: Wed, 06 Jun 2007
Source: Journal-Inquirer (Manchester, CT)
Copyright: 2007 Journal-Inquirer
Contact:  http://www.journalinquirer.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/220
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TOWN MUST REHIRE POLICE DISPATCHER AFTER STATE SUPREME COURT REFUSES
TO HEAR THE CASE

ENFIELD - The police dispatcher fired by the town in 2004 after being
accused of smoking marijuana in his home is free to return to work
after the town's effort to bar him from the job met a dead end in the
courts.

A Judicial Department spokeswoman confirmed this week that the state
Supreme Court has denied the town's petition to consider the case of
fired police dispatcher James Argenta.

The town was seeking to overturn an Appellate Court decision ordering
the town to reinstate Argenta.

Argenta said Monday that he's looking forward to returning to work and
putting the long saga behind him.

Argenta had worked for the Police Department for 11 years when he was
fired in January 2004 a month after his arrest by Enfield police
during a drug investigation.

Argenta admitted smoking marijuana occasionally in his home but not on
the job, and cooperated with the investigation.

Argenta later completed a pretrial drug education program for
first-time offenders, and the drug-related charges lodged against him
were erased from his record.

He also appealed his firing to a state arbitration panel, which ruled
in 2005 that while Argenta's conduct called for punishment, when
balanced with his stellar employment record with the Police
Department, termination was overly harsh. The panel ordered his
reinstatement.

Argenta's actions were unacceptable for a member of the Police
Department, and appealed the arbitration ruling in Superior Court in
an effort to overturn the decision.

Argenta's reinstatement.

The town then sought reconsideration of that decision with the state
Supreme Court.

But town officials learned last week that the Supreme Court opted not
to review the case, bringing an end to the three-year legal battle.

Police Chief Carl J. Sferrazza said Tuesday that Argenta is now free
to return to his former job, and the recent departure of another
dispatcher means there's room in the department's personnel budget to
add him back at no additional cost.

But Sferrazza said he stands by his long-held position on the
matter.

"Just as a matter of public policy, I don't believe that anyone who
works in the Police Department should be engaged in an illegal
activity," he said.

However, he added that the department would obey the letter of the law
in reinstating Argenta as ordered by the Appellate Court.

District 3 Councilman Scott R. Kaupin, the Republican minority leader
who had been a proponent of the legal efforts to bar Argenta's
reinstatement, said Tuesday that it was time for the town to move on.

"You get to the point where an issue has run its course,"

Kaupin said. "Even though we might disagree, we have to accept the
decision and move forward. At the same time, we have to be very
cognizant of how the employee is being treated. He deserves to be
treated properly, like anyone else."

Town Attorney and Public Safety Director Christopher Bromson said
Argenta is entitled to a fresh start.

"He comes back with a clean slate," Bromson said Tuesday. "There will
be no special scrutiny and he won't be treated any differently then
any other employee. The court has spoken and we will abide by the
letter of the law."

The timetable for Argenta's return is not clear, but it will be within
the next few weeks, Bromson said.

Because the Appellate Court ruling affirms the 2005 arbitration award
forbidding the town from firing Argenta and entitling him to back pay,
the town now owes the dispatcher 3= years of back pay, an amount
Bromson said hadn't been calculated yet.

Argenta has been employed recently, and whatever he earned at other
jobs would be deducted from the amount the town must pay him, Bromson
said.

According to William Mahoney, director of human resources, Argenta
will be rehired at an annual salary of $43,472. He did not have
available the amount of back pay Argenta is owed.
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MAP posted-by: Steve Heath